I finished watching the series “Shōgun.” Quite good. Now I’m googling, and here and there a phrase pops up that “the series is based on real events.” Reading Wikipedia. It turns out that the author James Clavell was inspired by a line from a book he was reading to his daughter: “In the year 1600, an Englishman went to Japan and became a samurai.” James took that line and expanded it into a novel of 2300 pages. Later it was slightly condensed.
“A samurai without a sword is like a samurai with a sword. Only without the sword.” (Yamamoto Musashi)
As for the challenges – after watching for 10 hours, in the end, I can only recall the name of the Englishman John, and just one of the central feudal lords – Toranaga… and Lady Mariko. For the rest, I have to search online.
I highly recommend it, it’s very beautiful and enlightening about cultural differences. Hard to say how historically accurate it is, but at least it’s beautiful.
Hi, I'm Rauf Aliev. 